To keep my child home from school on polling day

[SchoolOutForSummer]

Name change as this post will out me to all parents at our school ;)

Minor gripe here. School notified parents of holiday dates in September and these included the dates the school is closed for poling, including this Thursday.

Just received a letter today, telling us our Year 6 children must come to school on Thursday, to do extra work for their upcoming SATs exams.

I am slightly concerned that they will not be able to monitor ALL the members of public who will be in the school voting and wandering on and around the premises and keep them away from the children, which is why the school is closed.

I feel that as the rest of the school is closed from nursery up to year 5, then it should be closed for year 6 too. The year 6 children are all upset on the playground and feel they are being punished to lose their day off school.

School are concerned about their sats score. Which is laughable to think that one six hour day will make any difference to their scores. Teaching resentful children will not be effective...just let them have their 'planned for months' day off. The school has never pulled in year 6 children into school on polling day before and has reasonable sats scores and is a 'Good' school in ofsed terms.

Many parents including me have either paid for child care or planned a fun day out with siblings. Which will have to be cancelled last minute.

I know it is no big deal but I am tempted to just keep her off ill. Our letter promises that all absent year 6 children will be receiving a phone call from the school. My response would be the truth. She is very upset and stressed from all the pressure of these sats exams, therefore she will be staying home today. Would that be so unreasonable?

If the school had told us about this extra day in September or even a month ago, I would of sent her but leaving it so late and upsetting all the children seems so self defeating.

Plus I think sats is a massive waste of teachers time, I told DD to work hard and do her best but I don't want anymore headaches, tears and stomach aches over this issue

ChocolatWombat - I don't think SATs are good for my child's education though - in fact I think they are detrimental and the emphasis on them is unhealthy as well as educationally damaging. So it isn't about resisting the school's attempt to educate my child, or about trying to make a point about poor organization. It isn't about being annoyed that the school is ruining our "free" (?!) time. It's about resisting actions that put my child's long term learning and mental health in jeopardy.

Think about it this way, if the rest of the class attend, and it's a constructive day, would you really want you child to have missed out...for the sake of a day trip out (which let's be fair, could probably be rearranged for a weekend or the half term/summer holidays)?!

It's May they should have had sufficient education to cope with the SATs by now. I believe in education first, which is why I take a dim view on effectively encouraging cramming for exams.

Well, I would be interested in how people react once their kids get to GCSE stage. The pressure then will be much greater. Schools will run extra booster revision classes in the holiday and possibly at weekends, often with short notice.
Will some of you then be saying that you don't think GCSEs are educational and don't believe in cramming g for exams? Will you be advising your children not to attend because either it doesn't fit with your educational ethos or because you had already planned something for that day?
I would think that if you go as far as to believe SATs are educationally and mentally damaging, putting their future education and mental health in jeopardy, you really shouldn't be using the education system that creates this frightening danger.

I've got kids at GCSE secondary age and I still maintain what I said about KS2 SATs.

Ds primary had him as average at the local comp he was reassessed and streamed in top sets, often above his more talented SATs peers. Secondary is a different kettle of fish, the intensive work they do for year 6 and Year 2 SATs in no way prepares them for English at secondary level, if the school is wholly focussed on the SATs, rather than allowing teachers to get on and do their job, teach, they find creative writing etc hard.

So when schools have PD days parents are up in arms because they have to find childcare. So many complaints because PD days are a whole day of wasted learning time and "why can't teachers train in the holidays, they get plenty" etc, etc.

School is forced to close for polling - no benefit to the school whatsoever, a day of wasted learning time. School decides to try and rectify this, they assess which classes would be most affected and decide that Y6, with their impending SATs, would be most affected so come up with a plan to minimise the disruption for them.

"I wanted to take my child for a day out!"
Cue - YANBU, your child, your choice, stupid school messing people around etc, etc.

FFS, it's one day. Send her to school. If the SATs stress is affecting her life then you need to address that. Without polling it would have been a normal school day, school found a way to minimise disruption and you're complaining.

Schools don't close for staff

Every school I've been in does! It's the one bonus of this election.

Even as a teacher I'd say keep her off, as they'd already told you it wasn't a school day. They can't expect to change their mind like that. People will have booked time off work specially, arranged things etc.

The 'surprise' polling day in June will be after SATS so that shouldn't have effected anything.

Teaching days are sorted and set in stone at the beginning of each year. And the small minority of people who complain are also the same fools who moan about teachers getting long holidays and Christmas being expensive even though it happens every year.

Being fortunate enough to have free education does not mean blindly obeying the system. That's why I support the teachers when they strike. Or should I take my child in when the teachers strike and demand they are educated?

Keep off

"FFS It is one day"

I agree . Only one day. Not worth upsetting children just before their sats tests by forcing them to attend school when all the rest of the school is off.

I have already been clear...if this was a planned approach to polling day, I would of supported it. But this is a last minute panicked decision made by the school.

If they had opened the entire school, I would be happier in terms of consistent approach to education and the year 6 children would have no reason to be resentful.

But that could not happen on Thursday, as the 3 yo to 9 yo children couldn't safely access their playgrounds or their classrooms on a polling day.

Ironically the teacher sent a letter out saying the children were not worry about sats and enjoy their weekend and then come in on their planned day off to cram for the same exams

GCSE's exams are clearly very different.
They will directly affect her future and she will be 15/16yo and I hope will be able to deal better with cramming and exam pressure at that time.

Well you can view it as a last minute panicked decision by the school, or you can look on it as minimising disruption to learning. Our views on this are obviously very different but you did ask.

Keep her off. Don't keep her off. Only you know what works for you.

Sadly, this situation arises because there will always be the cohort of parents who begin the "school failed my child" chant after the SATs when they didn't get the results they wanted. School are covering their backs so that they can't turn round and tell them they wasted a day of learning by closing the whole school. There will always be the "well X school didn't close that day and their results were amazing" argument and so school are trying to avoid this.

You can't be annoyed with the school for organising more learning opportunities for your child, they didn't invent and implement SATS they are just trying to manage them.

Ps. My father was a teacher before he retired and I saw first hand the stress, paperwork and how little time off he got in the 'holidays'. I do understand how hard things are in teaching in general terms not particularly to do with sats.

Which is why had this day been planned properly ahead of time. I would support the teacher 100% even whilst I wondered why noone had told her that resentful children learn so very little and that a ten minute session another day would be more productive than a forced day session

No idea why christmas is relevent
FYI we save up and have a strict budget for christmas. It is not expensive as we don't have the luxury of wasting large amounts of our income on one day, we use that on daily living expenses. HTH

Oh come on. This school is not trying to find a way to minimise disruption. They are desperately trying to bring up the SATS results as THEY will be judged on them.

In your shoes OP I would be keeping her off. Childcare has to be planned in advance here as I have minimal options. If the school mess me around then my childcare gets messed around and I am less likely to get help when I need it next time. I hate the way schools seem to believe that parents are just hanging around ready to accommodate their every whim.

All this SATS angst is ridiculous. My son has SN and his school all out crammed from May to the SATS. Frankly I believe he received help during the tests (he doesn't have a TA) as his results were inflated. The SENCO at his secondary all but told me they were garbage. Thankfully secondary is excellent and assessed him themselves.

I'm sure the children will be safe and there will probably be some focussed small group work.

However ... they have given you short notice, you have already made plans and it sounds like it would be better for your child's mental health to have the day off.

chocolate

With the exception of The occasional extra lesson before or after school my school runs no holiday or weekend classes

Op, I made the Xmas comment in regards to the poster implying that you were one of those parents who moan about Teacher Training days etc too. Your comment on Xmas has helpfully emphasised my point that UANBU

Thanks HoneyDragon :)

It's just free at the point of delivery

Which for the vast majority is free. Very very few people pay in more than they take out, and most don't come remotely close to covering their own costs.

It might well be that not enough parents give permission to make the extra class worth it and the extra class will be cancelled at the last minute, anyway

Keep her off. One day will make zero difference. In year 7 there will be no time off at all so make the most of these last few months. Have a fun day!